Incels? Porn? What do you think?

[edger477]

I have also suffered from erectile dysfunction the last few times I actually tried sex with my partner.

A bit off topic but given you are in relation and mention this, that is actually normal if you ejaculated more often than your body is able sustain in days/weeks before that. As part of improvement of my (sex) life I started avoiding ejaculation (forgot to write that in my post), which after about a week makes me feel younger, have more energy and in second week some chronic pains I sometimes experience completely disappear (might not be 100% correlated but I noticed this). Other "side effects" are increase in willpower, extremely hard morning woods, high sex drive and increased creativity.

Of course just "avoiding" it does not really work because you would get wet dreams, you need to learn to enjoy the experience of sex itself and feel and consume that energy instead of letting it build to the point of explosion. You could try researching a bit about "cultivating male sexual energy" (a book by Mantak Chia), Sexual Kung Fu and check out this post viewtopic.php?p=324003#p324003
One of things I learned there is that sexual disfunction is a defense mechanism of male body, which is trying to prolong its own life by saving important energy and ingredients that are used for producing sperm. With age our gut can resorb less and less useful ingredients from food, and frequency of ejaculations that we can sustain is reducing with it. Learning to decouple orgasm from ejaculation is best thing you can do for own longevity. For me it only works with partner, if I use porn I never get that feeling of happiness/fulfillment if I don't ejaculate, while with my wife I can have sex practically until we are exhausted and if we simply stop my erection will go away in ~10 minutes and I don't feel any urge to "complete" it, I enjoyed it more than if I had ejaculatory orgasm without partner and I think main reason I did not experience sex in this way earlier is that we are conditioned by porn to think every sex must end with ejaculation.

[edger477]

Conclusion
This explains the general phenomenon of the angry, young, western, white male: privileged by birth even if born in a trailer park, yet feeling treated incredibly unjust. The women, the coloreds, non-heteronormatives: everyone gets treated preferentially but them! It would be funny if it wasn't so serious. These men truly suffer in their mind, and some of them put others through much more horrible and unforgiveable suffering because of it. Their attitudes towards sexuality are just one expression of the frustration that comes with a society that sends them mixed messages about their position within it and their moral desert. In my view these things are inseparably connected, a direct result of perceived social power structures. Which is also why this is such a strong theme in BDSM roleplay scenarios.

tldr; Porn helps to create frustrated males because it creates wrong expectations in regards to what they feel they deserve.

While I somewhat agree with tldr ("feel they deserve" I disagree with, is just wrong expectations in general, porn sells sex decoupled from everything else while in real relationship sex is cherry on top of the cake that relationship is), conclusion is just too far decoupled from reality and extremely oversimplified.

You should probably consume less of corporate media which is trying to lever identarian politics to describe every problem as somehow related to or part of some identity. Each one of us is a different person, different character with different morality, motivations and ambitions. I find it rather bigoted to be put in same box with all other people who look like me, it is what I do making me who I am, not how I look. Easiest argument to remove from conclusion (and only I will because it is enough) is that set of all incels is surely not made up exclusively out of only western whites. While western white males might be angry because of racism they are facing (as you said almost everyone else gets preferential treatment, only male Asians get it worse on western universities), this is separate ideopolitical subject that only barely overlaps with subject of incels.

In my opinion phenomena of incels is much more related to biology and difference in sexual power between males and females. Females have order of magnitude higher sexual power than males because of their role - they carry the offspring and cost of pregnancy is incomparably higher than cost of ejaculation. I am speaking from evolutionary perspective here, because our species just reached point where we have contraception and can have sex just for fun. So that more important role of women made them more important for society (that is why men were ones hunting and going to wars), as they are easier to replace (illustration: civilization that survives a disaster with 99 men and 1 women alive is doomed, while civilization that survives it with 99 women and 1 men is probably fine). Because of that discrepancy, women evolved higher standard for their partners (because until contraception became available bad partner is much more costly for women than for men).
Now we are at point where we have contraception, so women can have more sex, we have apps for that, but they don't instantly decrease their standards - because there is no reason to. That discrepancy leads to all women choosing just few percent of best looking men for casual sex, so those men have many female partners, but all other males have none. It is very similar to wealth distribution :)
This inequality will be most significant in big cities where tinder&co actually have most of its users and there is no social pressure against promiscuity from family and neighbors because almost no one who sees/meets you knows you.
If you add to this state programs that support single mothers and widespread availability of abortion (regardless of what is your moral stance of it) - all of it actually reduces perceived risk of male's partner character traits and allows physical looks to be prioritized - so it gets even more pronounced in western countries with good social programs.

So, based on above, I think incels are normal product of millions of years of evolution being faced with sudden changes in social environments and technological progress. It is very unfortunate for all affected people, but this is simply civilizational inflexion point, and big evolutionary pressure that they are under. I believe it will result in many of them working on themselves to stand out and changing their life for the better, and some of them deciding that pursuing women is not worth it and making purpose in life for themselves by advancing our civilization.

Most of humanity's great minds/inventors were either gay or incels, and that is not accident. Women's sexual power is higher than men's in another way - they are born with all of their eggs, and biological cost of menstruation is fixed (per month) and unrelated to amount of sex (so practically flat-rate) compared to men who have to produce sperm for every intercourse. Because of that women are able to have much more sex than men are (ignoring the sex drive here, just speaking of ability) - men who have too much sex will start suffering from erectile dysfunction because organism can produce only so much sperm, and all of it that is produced is taxing for rest of the body, taking away life and creative energy. Taoists realized that it and devised and practiced semen retention - a way to still enjoy the sex without loosing that energy and to be on par with women from sexual power aspect. See my post above for reference to learn more if interested.

With this I want to circle back to the topic - incels are natural outcome of our civilization's progress, but porn is what is keeping them down. Many of them are paying money to industry that is draining their energy - basically getting nothing in return except dopamine kick which makes everything else in life less enjoyable (because naked women bodies put our brains in overdrive - we did not evolve to look at them all the time). If you try to abstain from porn you will see how everything in life becomes more enjoyable, and maybe you might consider working on cultivating your sexual energy to use it to improve yourself and your life instead of throwing it away. If you constantly invest into yourself you are worth more every day than you were yesterday and that process of working on yourself will take you to cross path with someone who will see that and want to partner with you. Not because of how you look, but because of what you do.

P.S. related to that example with 99 men and 1 women - probably worst place to be man today is China, due to many years of their one-child policy which caused more of children being born to be males (because people believed son will be better able to care for them in old age than daughter) so they don't even have "women with high standards" problem - they have total lack of women.

[Orgentuno]

I apologize in advance for my English. But, they say, Google translator has become pretty good now. I trust him.

I can say right away - I'm sure that porn (both regular and Cock Hero) does not affect the movement of incels in any way. The main reason is that the pleasure of porn and the pleasure of real sex are two different things. The point is precisely that there is nothing better or worse. They are just different. It's like eating salty and sweet: we seem to perform the same action, but we get a different effect. One is not better than the other, just sometimes you want the first, sometimes the second, someone loves one more, and someone takes turns, one gets bored, etc.

It follows from this that any young people who "consume" porn do not "compensate" their thirst for real sex in any way, they only satisfy their hunger with another kind of food (sorry for the imagery). If you want sweet things, then no matter how much salty you eat, it will not be comparable to sweet in any way, you just eat for a while and you won’t want anything at all.

I'm sure some of the incels are seriously concerned that real sexual activity works the same way as Internet porn. Well, one can only feel sorry for such people, because they do not understand anything at all. Because the rules for "achieving the goal" are diametrically different here. On the Internet, you don't care about the character traits of the girl in the video. If you didn’t like some little thing on her body, one mole, you have no reason to get used to it, because there are hundreds, thousands of other girls on the Internet. If you didn’t like breasts, you can easily find even better ones in a couple of clicks. The figure, the face - there too. Doesn't do what you like - find one that does. And there is no need to find out and ask anyone, just write in the "Search" line. Fuck threesome, foursome - please. If you don't like the hardcore Coсk Hero, you can easily find a softcore one. Do I need to explain that in reality it all works in a completely different way. Since its inception, porn (as opposed to sex) has been not only a different PLEASURE, but also a different MARKET, if I may say so. Here demand and supply are arranged in a completely different way, so they are completely non-interchangeable. One can be a temporary surrogate for the other, depending on what the person prefers. Therefore, as a surrogate, access to porn only slightly reduces the aggression of young people who have not gained access to real sex. This and all his action on a similar type of people.

Actually, the very movement of incels is only a feature of time. People have a need to oppose something. And as life in the country gets better and better, they riot over increasingly petty and absurd topics. Because there is nothing more to complain about. Previously, there was "bread and circuses", and now - a weak wi-fi. Before - "if only not to go to prison and so that there would be no war," but now - this is it, incels.

Forgive me for inserting a policy, in my opinion it will be very out of place here. I, living in Russia, do not think about the influence of porn on incels. I don't think about this topic at all. Not because I'm not sensitive. Because, because of our government, I think that a nuclear missile would not fly on my head. Because there are no incels among my compatriots... more precisely, they are, but their head is occupied a little differently - how not to get into the meat grinder of war and what to do next when the whole world has decided that you are an asshole. Slightly different priorities. Do you think there is an incel movement in Ukraine now? I highly doubt it. No one will even listen to them there.

There are not so many joys and pleasures left in life in a large city that can be experienced with a very busy schedule. Watch a movie, take a walk, eat delicious food,have sex, masturbate. Catch a convenient time, as much as I can catch. But, pay attention: have sex is a relationship, this is life and maybe even the future. And to masturbate is to spend time with pleasure, like dinner at a restaurant. It has no effect on life. So the life of the Incels will not be affected in any way by the way they spend their evenings. No matter what they claim.

And in general, recalling my speech above, I want to say - you need to rejoice if somewhere, in some country, there are such movements as incels. Because it means that there are no really more serious, global problems.

[bhk100]

I've only read your first post (not the replies), so sorry if I may miss some bit of context, but here are some thoughts FWIW

Yet I don't get laid often enough, and I hate the fact that it seems to me that women have controlled me all of my life by means of withholding sexual access. I wonder, don't they WANT to fuck simply for the sake of fucking? I've sadly learned, no, there's been no woman whom I've ever dated who actually liked fucking for the sake of fucking. A few have promised, after long angst-ridden discussion, to initiate sex more often than they had done in the past. None have ever fulfilled that promise. I have never broken up with anyone for failing to initiate sex with me, but I have broken up with someone on the basis of the fact that she didn't keep promises. So, in some ways I may once have been a potential-incel but now find simply that I've grown out of resembling an angry incel with a manifesto. But that's probably only because I've grown out of wanting sex regularly. Or I've learned to masturbate more effectively?

(my emphasis in bold) This is a very logical, very male way to think about sexual relationships. It's also totally unhelpful and disempowering. Ask me how I know. Disempowerment and feelings of being a victim are one of the worst things that can happen to us--and only we can do it to ourselves--nobody can make us a victim.

Or ... I've never been an incel in the first place? I had some dating-friendly characteristics when I was of the dating-pool age, I did fine. I wasn't extremely frustrated, just a little bit frustrated. Still means I wasn't getting enough ... So, should I stop watching porn? Does watching it make me expect more sexual access then I'm getting? Whether or not I have a right to that access, do I start thinking I should have a right to it? How much access is the right amount of access?

Porn is not the problem IMO, as long as we're not talking about extremes. If you're doing nothing else, that might be a problem yes. But otherwise with few exceptions, pretty much anything is fine in moderation. So I think porn in this discussion is a scape goat.

You tell me. This is a fraught topic. I don't expect answers, only greater elucidation of the questions. I'm as angry at women as I am at employers -- they don't give me back enough, in exchange for what I give to them, and I feel that the system is so skewed that I have no choice but to continue to try to give and give even though I'm desperate to get more, and I'm unable to cajole finagle or force the system to actually do that reciprocation. It's the reciprocation that's missing. So I abandon trying to work within that system. By choice. This means I'm a volcel, I guess?

IMO what you, or any similarly minded reader may find enlightening is a read through of the red pill material and the "core reading" books that they recommend. There is some toxic bullshit there as well but if you look at the main principles it's all about self improvement, self discovery and self empowerment. The end result is not to become an uber-chad but to fix your mindset. And most importantly taking 100% responsibility for everything that happens to you in your life. Not saying it's easy, but I do believe that is the key to success and happiness in life overall (including with women, sexual relationships, etc).

(BTW I agree with you about the employer thing, it's a bad relationship, lol! That's why I started my own business We're more capable than society leads us to believe, if you don't like something, it's your duty to yourself to change it )

[drLED]

Short answer?

Everything you do in excess is bad. Sleep too much, eat too much, exercise too much... same goes for porn i think. We need some days to recover the strenght and adventure in porn universe again.

So true.

[DeanMoriarty]

Thank you both for your reactions @spaisin and @edger477 !

Self-perception is important for understanding any sort of "movement" or group and the tension between self and outside perception is relevant for understanding the process of radicalization. Hurt narcissists like Elliot Rodgers are the tip of the iceberg and the narcissistic personality disorders of people who commit violent acts for public attention are probably always the more relevant category to explain their behaviour. But narcissists are volatile especially because of the dissonance between self-image and outside-perception. When a narcissist fails to reconcile the two, he suffers a crisis. The intense discrepancy between the two makes the feelings so strong. Most don't shoot up random people, though.

I don't expect anyone and especially not entire groups of people to reflect on their socio-economic position on a global scale and even if they did: I don't think this would enable them to transcend their own beliefs and it doesn't need to. Plus, social inequality is ubiquitous and multi-dimensional and as soon as you go to the level of individual relationships power becomes sociologically amorphous. I also wouldn't want to focus on the legitimacy of self-perceptions. And I absolutely regret mentioning the "trailer-park", because I think this is a middle class phenomenon.

I think incels are more than just males who are losing the mating game - which is an anthropological constant as you rightly said @edger477 - there will always be some men who are disadvantaged in this regard. I believe incels as a self-proclaimed movement are the product of a specific constellation in which it is important that they are actually NOT disadvantaged in many other categories. Its not only about being deprived of what you WANT or even NEED, its depravation of what they feel they DESERVE. Privilege comes with a sense of moral desert, even more so if its considered average (we pretty much all feel entitled to running water, I suppose, but this is actually a pretty significant privilege that our societies afford us. I'm pointing this out because I don't want to limit the use of privilege to the very narrow context of North American culture wars, in which almost all analytical categories become ideological weapons). The higher the discrepancy between what someone feels they deserve and what they think they're getting - the higher their frustration.
I think that never before there were more men feeling this entitled to a specific kind of sexual gratification and were denied it at the same time - partly because this kind of sexual gratification is rare or entirely unrealistic. Porn contributes to this significantly but not exclusively and not even decisively.

But it also hinges on the definition of Incel - if we just take the simplest self-description, it is everyone who is involuntarily celibate - wants to have sexual relationships but has no opportunity, whether or not they consider themselves as such. I don't think this is actually the best description of incels. I think incels especially refers to western, white males under the age of 40 who feel excluded from sexual relationships because of misguided attitudes in their specific societies and also voice this out. Feel free to disagree (as with everything else), because I have absolutely no proof for this :) But as @Orgentuno reminds us - incels seems to have a bit of a "luxury problem" compared to people living in countries with more acute problems.

I'd like to point out a contrast: the hardest country for males to live in isn't China, which has tipped its male to female ratio towards men after decades of a 1-child policy (its slowly normalizing now that it has been abandoned: https://www.statista.com/statistics/282 ... age-group/).
Its India!
Why is India worse? Apart from being poor and sectarian and stricken with corruption, in this context I mean that nowhere else, including China, there are more young men who have no hope of ever getting married - the classic and only socially accepted way of finding a mate in the largest part of society. Those millions of men, excluded from the prospect of marriage for mainly economic reasons, are not part of the incel movement - at least they don't seem to make their voices heard there. (China and India are also among the nations with the highest rates of violent domestic abuse towards women, so these developments are entirely unrelated to any sort of female empowerment). In both societies marriage partners are traditionally organized by the parents, so women's choices don't even factor in - and women choices are at the center of incel beliefs (whether or not they are right is a different question).

Now, what does all this mean for the individual milovana user?
Nothing. We all consume porn in one way or another (probably more of the latter), and we're mostly male (I assume). Beyond that I think this is actually a pretty diverse userbase - this thread alone is proof of that to me. Pornography significantly influences our lives - but if it does so positively or negatively is an open question for each of us to ask ourselves. Insisting that it doesn't have any effect, that is the only thing I personally find unhealthy.

[edger477]

Its not only about being deprived of what you WANT or even NEED, its depravation of what they feel they DESERVE.

Your whole post does add interesting points, but out of them all I think this is most important one that I might have missed myself. You might be right, there are many people who feel entitled to something for no other reason than existing, and I believe this purely comes out of lack of problems in life (as pointed out by Orgentuno). It is very similar to dopamine receptors - they get burned out from too much porn causing inability to enjoy normal things, similar to that you will create problems when you don't have them; so regardless where you live your subjective experience of struggle is same - because your brain calibrates to your experience, person that is struggling to buy bread for their kids feels similar amount of stress as a person struggling to get back their impounded Ferrari.

I think this is one of reasons why western civilization is destroying itself, people became too weak and unable to sustain themselves but still expect to live at higher level of comfort than generation who worked to get it there. At same time they keep fighting each other for problems whose solution seems to be very low priority for majority of humans (basically living in own bubble unaware of actual reality). For me that feeling of entitlement also seems to be correlated to lack of masculinity, people who are weak and irresponsible expect someone else to provide for them what they think they are entitled to and it might actually be feedback loop - more state intervention and handouts makes people more dependent, causing them to become more entitled and so in spiral, at some point they have to reach the point they don't receive something they started to believe they deserve.
Remember the signs in national parks: "Don't feed the animals, because they will become too dependent and unable to fend for themselves". I think this is where many people in western "democracies" (I use quotes because I think almost all of them are oligarchies now) are, and there is for sure some overlap with incels. I would argue that western men who are self-reliant and independent cannot belong to incels, they can only be volcels, and I know some who are voluntarily without partner because available pool of women is inadequate for them (similar story about entitlement and feeling they deserve x for no particular reason that those men don't want to tolerate just to have some).

Clearly, this problem is much wider than porn, and I don't unconditionally condemn porn, but I strongly believe that unmoderated consumption of porn and videogames are means that keep many of those unhappy people in status quo, providing them with enough of dopamine/fake happiness to stay where they are and not try to change their lives. Those two are main culprits along with already mentioned junk food, sedentary lifestyle and acceptance of emasculation as a positive thing.

[spaisin]

Because the rules for "achieving the goal" are diametrically different here. On the Internet, you don't care about the character traits of the girl in the video. If you didn’t like some little thing on her body, one mole, you have no reason to get used to it, because there are hundreds, thousands of other girls on the Internet. If you didn’t like breasts, you can easily find even better ones in a couple of clicks. The figure, the face - there too. Doesn't do what you like - find one that does. And there is no need to find out and ask anyone, just write in the "Search" line. Fuck threesome, foursome - please. If you don't like the hardcore Coсk Hero, you can easily find a softcore one. Do I need to explain that in reality it all works in a completely different way.

Heh.. can you think of an app this brings to mind from the female perspective? The next 'date' being just a simple swipe away. It makes the opportunity cost of ditching this one zero; or at least gives the appearance of it.

The combination creates a great situation where women get themselves abused on tinder by a group of "top tier" men and the leftover men end up shutting themselves in and seeking porn "for the time being". I can't say which side has it worse, and I don't really care, it's pretty rotten for everyone involved. Or Not involved..

I'd say we're just not ready for these technologies as a species / culture. I hope the culture can catch up, but I just don't see how it would. Especially when there's absolutely nothing wrong in porn, or sleeping around, and suggesting otherwise is shut down as evil.

But I hope I'm just a cynic

But it also hinges on the definition of Incel - if we just take the simplest self-description, it is everyone who is involuntarily celibate - wants to have sexual relationships but has no opportunity, whether or not they consider themselves as such. I don't think this is actually the best description of incels. I think incels especially refers to western, white males under the age of 40 who feel excluded from sexual relationships because of misguided attitudes in their specific societies and also voice this out.

So, you added "speaking out", "feeling exluded", "<40", "white" and "western" to improve the definition. Speaking out doesn't sound like a problem, feeling excluded may often be pretty accurate; western - sure, it's an anglophone set of forums, so just the language barriers make it western. Other cultures, like japanese, have their own subcultures for destitude men; or like India are still governed by a more archaic structure for mating in general, partially reforming the issue into something else.
I don't really see the point for an arbitrary age limit or an arbitrary race limit in the mix, and as such, I don't really see you've improved the definition.

I believe incels as a self-proclaimed movement are the product of a specific constellation in which it is important that they are actually NOT disadvantaged in many other categories. Its not only about being deprived of what you WANT or even NEED, its depravation of what they feel they DESERVE.

The basic requirements for participating in an internet discussion for periods of time, make the "not exactly destitude economically" a pre-requisite. You need the free time and the net connection - it's not a huge barrier, but there's also booze once you're down enough.

The "movement" does indeed attract people who think they either "want", "need" or "deserve" something more than they're getting; but it gets a whole lot of the ones who "think they deserve" realize that they actually "merely want, and can be happier just improving themselves, for themselves". The bigger influencers in the "manosphere" seem dedicated to that message. I'd see the movement as a positive in its overall effect. Sad that it has to exist, good that it does; even if not everyone can be helped.

I would argue that western men who are self-reliant and independent cannot belong to incels, they can only be volcels, and I know some who are voluntarily without partner because available pool of women is inadequate for them (similar story about entitlement and feeling they deserve x for no particular reason that those men don't want to tolerate just to have some).

I'm not entirely sure which side you're going for, or both; but "men having standards" seems to get conflated with "entitlement" often. Having figured out that you want something specific shouldn't be an issue for anyone, as long as you're willing to risk not actually getting it. I know I am ..

[book_guy]

I've only read your first post (not the replies), so sorry if I may miss some bit of context, but here are some thoughts FWIW...

Thanks for your thoughts. I think I'm in agreement with you commentary about the "redpill" advice though I'm not well-versed in its content. Similarly, I would generally be an advocate in favor the mPUA and fast-seduction materials, not because they necessarily make sure someone gets laid fast, as much as because they self-empower the initiate to be able to improve upon his life through various OTHER means, and, if that self-empowerment also causes him to exude some kind of confidence-glow which ultimately attracts viable female partners, then, that's good too!

You've emphasized the wrong part, here:

Yet I don't get laid often enough, and I hate the fact that it seems to me that women have controlled me all of my life by means of withholding sexual access. I wonder, don't they WANT to fuck simply for the sake of fucking? I've sadly learned, no, there's been no woman whom I've ever dated who actually liked fucking for the sake of fucking. A few have promised, after long angst-ridden discussion, to initiate sex more often than they had done in the past. None have ever fulfilled that promise. I have never broken up with anyone for failing to initiate sex with me, but I have broken up with someone on the basis of the fact that she didn't keep promises. So, in some ways I may once have been a potential-incel but now find simply that I've grown out of resembling an angry incel with a manifesto. But that's probably only because I've grown out of wanting sex regularly. Or I've learned to masturbate more effectively?

(my emphasis in bold) This is a very logical, very male way to think about sexual relationships. It's also totally unhelpful and disempowering. Ask me how I know. Disempowerment and feelings of being a victim are one of the worst things that can happen to us--and only we can do it to ourselves--nobody can make us a victim.

Agreed, on the analysis. But the part you bold-ed is the part I don't actually believe in, in the first place. It's the NEXT sentence, which I'll here repeat, that makes my point much better:

I have never broken up with anyone for failing to initiate sex with me, but I have broken up with someone on the basis of the fact that she didn't keep promises.

In fact (to play devil's advocate a bit) all you've advocated, bhk100, is that I stop being male, in order to better enjoy my male drives within relationships. If only I'd stop wanting what I want, I could learn to be more happy with my unhappiness. If I would just stop hoping to get any of the things which I hope to get, then, hey, I wouldn't be unhappy about not getting them! LOL ...

I know, I know, you didn't mean it that way, and I don't actually take it that way. But somewhere in there, I have to have the right to reject a woman who fails to keep promises, on the basis of that very failure, don't I? What's the alternative? I can't imagine that we're going to start advocating for the fact that all female indiscretion of all sorts is entirely approvable and unavoidable, because as females, they have different rules, and those rules don't include requirements for moral or decent behavior. Love them as they are, not as you wish them to be, even if they're cheating on you and shooting your mother? Seems extreme. Maybe we can stop somewhere between the two extremes, I would hope. My story about sexual initiation and breaking promises was, not in actuality, a story from my life, but rather a fair metaphor for the type of actions and behaviors I was receiving from my partners.

A way to understand it is, that they were testing-testing-testing, to the point that only bad behavior ever came out of their hopper in order to see if I would put up with bad behavior. I realized this was typical feminine testing, and that if I were alpha-male enough, I'd push back against that bad behavior and thereby cause both (a) her respect for my level of dominance, and (b) better behavior from her. But it would also mean, that I was perpetuating a relationship with someone who engaged in rather bad behavior in the first place! My point of view on that was, that I didn't want to help someone like that to spend time with me. I guess that was wrong-headed in some way, so the redpill and fast-seduction people would say. I disagree. I know, I'm flying in the face of a lot of traditional Mars-versus-Venus analysis. I think women aren't as Venusian as all that. I reject "the selfish gene," Richard Dawkins be damned, and I've read the whole (poorly written) book twice through. So there. :)

So, do me the favor of not missing my main point. I'm saying I did fine with women, and then chose not to be with them. Mostly, they were 90's bitches, full of professional levels of frivolity which, so the game goes, it was my responsibility to cut through. Sure, I COULD HAVE been all frickin' alpha about it, and demanded more reliable staid behavior from them, either by actions (as you seem to be advocating) which would have brought about "build a better girlfriend" type behaviors from them; or (as I misleadingly reported in the sentence you bolded) just by words, making verbal demands. Or I COULD HAVE learned to accept the fact that, hey, females won't be rational or decent about things, love 'em for what they are, don't expect anything better, the sweet lil' ol' thangs, ain't they purdy? It therefore seems that my two choices in the face of bad behavior were to control her or to accept her, because the bad behavior was an intrinsic part of her. But I chose a third route: I judged her. I stopped wantng her, and instead judged that her bad behavior was ... well ... bad. If she's going to be immoral and frivolous, I'm going to choose another human as a partner.

Sound bad? But I don't mean this in a bitter, incel-who-whines kind of way. I mean, simply, I wasn't meeting quality women, and I wasn't eliciting quality behavior from the women that I did meet. I'll take whatever responsibility goes with that -- my own poor search and hunt strategies, my weakness at behavior-elicitation, and some bad luck, of course. But I won't take the remainder of the responsibility -- they chose the bad acts. For my part, I provided a quality boyfriend, of quality material, and yet they didn't reciprocate. It was the 90's, they were busy trying to be more and more like Carrie Bradshaw of "Sex and the City" -- flighty, inept, with very expensive shoes, and a self-congratulatory RIGHT and NEED to mislead and lie because that's, you know, FEMININE. Nope.

Then again, partly, I have to admit, they just weren't hot enough for me. Somebody who is so much of a turn-on that I will put up with that kind of crap (or, more accurately, will learn to overcome that kind of crap, so I don't have to put up with it) in order to get laid by her? I guess that's the system. If she's so damned amazing that I just gotta have it, then, I'll start learning how to handle her, right? Well, I haven't ever met that woman. (I guess I have seen images of what I imagine and fantasize to be that person, but I know it's a false fantasy from porn, hence this discussion.) I'd love to have so much overwhelming "need" for the girl, that I chase after the girl AND that I accept some of her flighty behavior as something endemic to the system, something I learn to handle by defusing it. But frankly I'd rather not capitulate to the Carrie-Bradshaw gamesmanship, not capitulate in either circumstance, whether capitulation would have meant (a) exacerbating it by enabling it, or (b) contradicting it as my "job" because the male needs to somehow "demand" or "cause" decent behavior from the female.

I don't hate the playa, I hate the game.

I don't think I could have articulated any of this as cogently as I feel I'm doing, now. When I was involved in dating women, all I was experiencing was befuddlement. "Wait, you made a promise, and you broke it, and the reason is because you're a woman. So, for me to make you stop breaking promises, I have to marry you. But marriage is a promise, right?" That, or, "You said I was so meaningful to you. Why then do you reject me for sexual interaction?" I can see through all these wiles, now, a few decades after the fact. But I didn't see through them at the time, not handily enough to actually act on any perception I might have had. It was all, "geez, these people keep treating me shitty. I need better people." I look back on that decision and I don't say, "gosh golly I should have had the redpill info earlier! I so regret not being well-informed." Rather, I look back and say, "yup, I was right. Although the redpill info is probably pretty good, I needed better people."

I have a (perhaps idiotic) perception that subsequent generations are rather much better. I had the opportunity to enter a graduate program with a lot of people who were much younger than me. I was in my middle 40s, they were mostly straight out of undergrad. This program started in the middle-2000s. I saw that dating mechanics among all those younger classmates were, in my perception, a lot less screwed up than what I had undergone. This could be because I was screwed up and, no matter what generation I was involved in, I would have screwed up experiences. Or, it could be, instead, that those people were involved in less screwed up dynamics, and I was witnessing a better set of human interactions. Or it could be that those classmates weren't necessarily indicative of a generational shift, but were merely a select group of smarter or more socially adept people, by dumb luck or by highly selective criteria for that particular graduate program. Anyway, it stood in stark juxtaposition to what I had undergone as a very young adult. I wasn't seeing violence, knives, addictions, rampant cheating, all excused as "feminine" the way I had experienced in a different city at a different school during a different decade. The women seemed more secure in their knowledge that they would have to be accepted as roughly equal to the men, less whiny and less demanding, more willing to accept respect on the basis of intrinsic merit rather than the basis of manipulation; and in particular the men seemed much more likely to reject any fraud that anyone attempted to excuse as mere expression of "femininity." The men were quite comfortable demanding better behavior; and the women, or so it seemed to me, were less dependent on using bad behavior to aggrandize themselves.

I'm glad that later classmates, those closer-to-Millennial, probably had a better experience than I did. But that group of closer-to-Millennials is also the cohort from which the Incel Movement is derived. So, I'm not entirely sure whether my perception is accurate, or even whether it is indicative of a societal change or just a singular group that I interacted with. Hence this discussion. I'd really like to understand how hard the Incel has fallen, and whether I'm also perceiving that group of classmates accurately. I'd like to know, back in the 90s when I was a young buck, were those women I met really all that bad? I would, at first, like to say, "probably not, you probably were just a typically frustrated clueless male." But then, after some analysis and my best shot at fair comparison,I'm coming around to saying, instead, "probably so, I mean, don't you remember X and Y and Z behaviors?" Young women don't seem to engage in X and Y and Z any more. Do they? If so, then are the Incels justified in their whining? Or, if they don't engage in X and Y and Z, then, aren't the Incels even less justified than I would have been? Personally, I never engaged in misogyny of that sort; I always figured that something was my own fault, somehow the negatives I was experiencing had something to do with bad choices on my part. (And you pretty much have to accept that much, even if it is only marginally true, since that's the only thing you can change anyway!)

[throwawayacct]

A lot of this discussion evaporates once a whole lot of men and young men go get some fucking therapy.

[dalin55738]

A lot of this discussion evaporates once a whole lot of men and young men go get some fucking therapy.

You are 100% correct.

The problem isn't porn but, as others have said, how our culture subconsciously prescribes unrealistic expectations for how a partner should look. Even if you consciously know that most girls don't look like Kagney Linn Karter, you've seen enough of her in positive contexts that your brain is going to start associating blonde hair, big tits, low-to-medium body fat, and a youthful appearance with a potential endorphin rush.

If you try dating women that don't look like a pornstar, you'll have far more success. Also – and this is really important – you start seeing those women as attractive. Sounds like bullshit, right? Well, look at trends of physical female beauty throughout Western, Euro-centric culture and it constantly changes with cultural attitudes. For examples Elizabethan beauties with a thick body and little, perky tits to the 1920's flapper with a thin, waifish body to Marilyn Monroe with more curves to 1990s heroin chic of Kate Moss or Fionna Apple to the "slim thicc" proportions of Nicky Minaj and Kim Kardashian. The "ideal" feminine look is culturally informed, which means it is learned. If you can be learned to find Kagney Linn Karter attractive, then you might be able to feel the same about Beanie Feldstein. (And not gonna lie, I thought Beanie was hot as Monica Lewinsky.)

And I'm sure there are some red-pilled individuals reading these words as "He's just saying we should settle for sub-5 females" and if you do think that, stop thinking that way. Stop rating and judging people. And not just women, either, but stop rating and judging yourself and comparing yourself to other men. It's a really hard mindset to get out of since competition is so ingrained into our society, and it informs everything from our economy (Capitalism is inherently about competition and we take for granted that other economic models even exist) to this idea that men need to compare "conquests". Even as a "progressive", "feminist", "beta cuck", I still had these toxic ideas so ingrained into my mindset that it took practically my entire 20s to get out of it.

What I'm actually saying is that you should meet and talk to more women in general, which will start having a more proportionate influence on what you find attractive than just your time with porn and pop culture. If you currently spend 90% of your time with women from media and 10% real women in your life, that has an effect on you. If you can balance it to something closer to 50/50, you'll notice a difference.

I'm not saying you'll automatically find the fat Sports Illustrated model as attractive. However, despite what Dr Peterson thinks, plenty of us already do. What I'm saying is that what you find attractive will change and it'll hopefully change more towards women in your actual life. And if you are meeting and talking to women in your life, you'll feel more comfortable when engaging with a girl in a romantic way.

The thing is, plenty of women are as perverted as we are. I chat with them all the time, online and in person. I have platonic friendships with women who are nymphomaniacs, asexual, pansexual, kinky, vanilla, porn addicts, and prudes. The thing is, they aren't going to post on a forum if they don't feel comfortable. And while I don't know the demographics of this forum, I have a feeling there are plenty more women lurking than y'all probably realize.

To be 100% clear, I am not trying to shame or accuse anyone of doing anything morally, ethically wrong. I don't hate incels or the "manosphere" as much as I relate to these guys and, honestly, just want to see them live happier lives. I've been in similar places throughout my life, so I know how alone and hopeless it can feel. Our society does a lot to keep us isolated and it only promotes unhealthy behaviors. Part of the work is, as a collective, to change society and its values.

But another part is to improve ourselves. This is one aspect of the pick-up artist mentality I agree with. Exercise and eat better, if you're able. At the very least, read up on basic nutrition and stop fad diets that focus too much on macronutrients (like fat, carbs, and protein) and not enough on micronutrients. Go out and meet people. I've been happily married for 7 years but I can't imagine how much harder it would've been to be single during a pandemic. Get in Discords and other social forums based around shared interests. Meet women without any intention of romance by going to activities like local sports leagues or poetry/comedy/music open mics.

And don't get into a parasocial relationship, especially with a sex worker. I think that's the real danger of something like OnlyFans. The commodification of romance and friendship is a lot scarier than the commodification of sex.

As far as addiction, I do think it's important to read up on new developments in psychology. A lot of behaviors that were previously thought to be addictive (such as video gaming, shopping, sex addiction, etc.) are now believed to be symptoms of a different neurological condition, such as ADHD, autism, manic depression, etc. That is why it is EXTREMELY important to talk to a therapist and get educated about how those things work and what sorts of medication or behavioral therapy could help. I had a pretty bad "Facebook addiction" until I discovered I had depression and ADHD, the kind of ADHD where I can so easily "hyperfocus" on one thing if it currently interests me (which might explain this long response; but hey, my medication's setting in, so I'll wrap it up.)

Anyway, hope that's helpful for someone.

[DeanMoriarty]

You make a lot of good points @dalin55738, but I'd like to highlight this paragraph:

To be 100% clear, I am not trying to shame or accuse anyone of doing anything morally, ethically wrong. I don't hate incels or the "manosphere" as much as I relate to these guys and, honestly, just want to see them live happier lives. I've been in similar places throughout my life, so I know how alone and hopeless it can feel. Our society does a lot to keep us isolated and it only promotes unhealthy behaviors. Part of the work is, as a collective, to change society and its values.

Not just because of your admirable empathy and optimism (I myself am very pessimistic when it comes to the potential for meaningful change within individuals and "getting therapy" will unfortunately not happen for most who need it), but it also points to the question: what can WE do about this?

Is milovana in general (and Cock Hero in particular) promoting unhealthy behaviours and expectations, entirely or at least partially?

It seems most people in this thread consider the responsible consumption of porn to be harmless. I guess we're biased. We come here to arouse ourselves :)

Many point out the importance of self-discipline, self-improvement, turning to more healthy behaviours and a positive mindset to counteract the feeling of being excluded from something that isn't maybe that real to begin with.

I'll try to argue this intentionally provocatively:
Isn't that like suggesting to a coughing chain smoker to pick up jogging, to offset the effects of their smoking, instead of telling them to quit altogether? Isn't reduction or complete abstinence from the unrealistic phantasmagoria of porn most favourable?

And maybe the inverse is also interesting: in what way does or under what conditions would porn improve this situation?

(I don't want make milovana responsible for anything, btw, and I don't think anything should change about it, except for maybe being able to sort the forum by age of the original post ;) )

[dalin55738]

Thanks for the compliments, Dean. I want to address this quesiton, if not directed solely towards me:

I'll try to argue this intentionally provocatively:
Isn't that like suggesting to a coughing chain smoker to pick up jogging, to offset the effects of their smoking, instead of telling them to quit altogether? Isn't reduction or complete abstinence from the unrealistic phantasmagoria of porn most favourable?

Smoking can have positive effects, though, such as the potential benefits of nicotine in preventing Alzheimers. And smoking in public often involves gathering with strangers in a separate area where you can freely socialize from a starting point of the common vice you all share. I realized I was an extrovert after I started smoking. Although I haven't had a cigarette in 10 years and could have learned to be social without the harm to my lungs. I didn't, though, and other attempts at socialization failed, for some reason.

But that's kind of my point: those benefits are both secondary to the act of smoking itself. Likewise, consuming porn isn't a single act; it's composed of a series of different physiological and psychological activities.

There's coitus, sure, but also the slow endorphin release associated with edging, the narrative aspect in plot-driven or even most gonzo scenes, the satisfaction of finding new content (like when you discover a new TV show you want to watch), the social aspect if you watch with a partner or discuss on places like Milovana, or even the thrill of getting away with something taboo (like if you're hiding it from a partner or doing it during work hours, etc.)

So the question shouldn't be "is porn harmful?" but rather "Which aspects of porn are harmful?" as well as "What can we do about that?" That's part of why I agree with talking to a therapist. But it's also why I kind of like that the people here are wanting to ask these sorts of questions.

For me personally, I think the main problem with porn is that it's easier for me to spend free time on it rather than something productive, like playing music. It's just easier to shut off the brain and rush for those stims in a video game or porn site, and I'm usually so overworked that I don't want to focus and concentrate anymore. But is that a problem with porn or a problem with my work/life balance?

[spaisin]

The "ideal" feminine look is culturally informed, which means it is learned.

Hmm.. I'm not fully convinced. If that was the case, I'd be going down a rabbit hole of the "pornstar look"; while in reality, I'm gravitating away from tattoos and bolt-ons towards youthfulness and fitness. Sure, I've never been a fan of tats IRL, for a while they were intriguing. In my porn prefs the tats made an appearance and a disappearance.. for body type, curves are great, but almost any signs of modifications are starting to be a turn-off (as in, if you can fool me, fine, but scars, weird shapes etc etc have become a turnoff). Despite being subjected to them regularly, in a 'dopamine positive' context.

Now, I'm not saying our media doesn't matter, but looking back at something like "heroin chic" and assuming it was enjoyed by the majority.. that's a bit of a leap. Great way to sell stuff and copied aplenty just for "being popular" but did it really make anyone actually like it, though? That specific one came and went fast, shouldn't such changes have some permanence? Older styles were changing slower, sure, but were even they enjoyed by the wearers? Fainting in a corset doesn't sound like a life goal; even though some people do it even today, with quite spectacular results.

Even then, if we assume we can change people's preferences, and lets say we figure out how to actually do it effectively. Should we? Would it be right to do? Intentionally rewiring someone's brain, basically without their consent; well, hypno-porn does seem like an interesting niche...

In what direction? I'd steer it away from tats and bolt-ons, towards healthy, fit people - for some odd reason. Although, that idea seems to get some negative feedback nowadays.

Should we leave it up to a vote? "This next 4 years, we'll be bringing back the gray overalls" "Oh no, these things suck, let's get the bondage kit out next time!"
Should we leave it up to the marketing departments? I fear we might have to...
Should we come up with some arbitrary rules about "Social issues" and rate the stocks of corporations against those rules, and require investment firms to take those rules as a directing indicator for their purchasing?
Should we ban it altogether? Yeah, that'll work ...

Honestly, I just hope we never get good at it.

[dalin55738]

Hmm.. I'm not fully convinced. If that was the case, I'd be going down a rabbit hole of the "pornstar look"; while in reality, I'm gravitating away from tattoos and bolt-ons towards youthfulness and fitness. Sure, I've never been a fan of tats IRL, for a while they were intriguing. In my porn prefs the tats made an appearance and a disappearance.. for body type, curves are great, but almost any signs of modifications are starting to be a turn-off (as in, if you can fool me, fine, but scars, weird shapes etc etc have become a turnoff). Despite being subjected to them regularly, in a 'dopamine positive' context.

Right, so you are describing your tastes changing. You aren't attracted to bolt-ons and tats, which is the "pornstar look" in some ways. But you are obviously attracted to a type that is still popular and catered to. After all, natural, young girls without tattoos is a large market.

I never said "every person" is going to be attracted to the "societal standard"; I simply said that a large portion of society is drawn to it, for whatever reason.

Now, I'm not saying our media doesn't matter, but looking back at something like "heroin chic" and assuming it was enjoyed by the majority.. that's a bit of a leap. Great way to sell stuff and copied aplenty just for "being popular" but did it really make anyone actually like it, though?

Why would you assume a majority of people at the time didn't find that attractive? While I can't say for sure that they did, why else would beauty standards change over time? Sure, marketers and media re influencing people, but they are adapting their tactics based on society and culture as much (if not more than) they are influenced by them.

Even then, if we assume we can change people's preferences, and lets say we figure out how to actually do it effectively. Should we? Would it be right to do? Intentionally rewiring someone's brain, basically without their consent;

Regardless if it's right, it's already being done. It's not just marketing, either, but everything we interact with is going to have some effect on our brain, whether it's listening to an advertisement on YouTube, seeing a neighbor's political sign, or the smell of the fried chicken restaurant across the street.

In what direction? I'd steer it away from tats and bolt-ons, towards healthy, fit people - for some odd reason. Although, that idea seems to get some negative feedback nowadays.

I mean, you do you. I just find that most people who are "concerned about someone's health" care more about controlling them than actually helping the health, spending time insulting fat people instead of writing congress about the sugar content of peanut butter. (Seriously, peanut butter doesn't need sugar for any reason except that corn syrup is cheaper filler than actual peanut butter.)

If there's a systemic reason Americans are fatter than the rest of the world, we should find a systemic solution to fix the problem. As far as "healthy, fit" people being unpopular, that's not really true as much as people conflating the notion that you shouldn't make fun of fat people with the idea that people should strive to be unhealthy.

Honestly, I just hope we never get good at it.

Like I said, some people are already really good at it. But what you're describing is literally the process that legislators and constituents go through on a daily basis (when in session, I should say). I don't know the answer about what to do because, like I said before, what is the actual problem we're trying to fix? What specific aspects of porn are a problem and how can those issues be rectified?